The Songs of Mourning
by theowlinsomniac
Summary: After the Ishvalan War, Riza Hawkeye is stolen from her future and hidden from the world by none other than the Red Lotus Alchemist: Solf J. Kimblee. He will stop at nothing to get what he wants, access to the alchemy lodged onto her back, and the power he believes he's never received.
1. Part One: Requiem

**There is a trigger warning regarding abuse and violence. **

_AN: This story will be in three parts, and I can hopefully say that this will be the darkest of the three, and perhaps the longest. _

_All characters belong to Hiromu Arakawa, and the plot is my own work._

_This part jumps around a bit so please bear with me. _

_Read with care and at your own risk. Thank you for reading! _

* * *

Requiem

. A hymn, composition, or service for the dead.

* * *

The shrieks of shoes moving across wooden floors was not uncommon in the humid cabin. A white vest and dark sets eyes that cut and tore each other could also be found here.

Bony hands twitched in deep-set pockets and a loose tank top that sheltered pallid, beaten skin moved across the floor like a shadow. Thinned legs carried his violent body through the threshold of the grizzled room. His charcoal hair was greasy from neglect as were his palms. There was a distinct odor emitting from his body, like withered roses. He smelled sickly but the sight of his sharpened features and muscular body would deny the weakness in his scent.

The smirk that he'd been blessed with arrived on his lips as he saw her by the window. He stood like ice and observed her kindred spirit body gently wilt through deep brown eyes that bled at the glass. His eyes moved from her frail but once-sturdy body to the window itself and beyond. There was a soft snowfall that eased from the clouds to sleep on the gravel and decaying rocks outside. There was a feeble movement and the sharp eyes were again on the woman before him. He flicked his eyes over her, a fading memory of her old stance haunting him for moments until bitter and prideful dominance overcame him and he remembered who'd changed her. He remembered that he had killed the beauty she'd once been.

The sullen and sleepless bruises beneath her eyes were evidence of permanent habits. She'd caught the insomnia that he'd acquired as a young boy and he often awoke to the sound of her tears forming puddles in the sheets. Her arms were wrapped around her knees, a one-sided hug, a source of comfort in the cold. The body that used to attract was now beaten and old, riches to rags, muscle to bone. Under the torn tee-shirt there were scars that would never quite heal. They raked from her throat to her shoulders. Some were higher, some where lower. Some even dared to trace her outer thigh. The prominent ones encircled her wrists and ankles, and the deepest were around her waist. No longer was she untouched but she was ravaged. She was plagued by the scars and the burns and the morphed skin he had gifted to her when he didn't please her just right. In the moment of the snow, she wore nothing but a shirt and under garments. There was no need for modesty. Years of blatant dismissal of privacy had proved that to her. She was silent to the exception of a breath every few moments, or the wiggle of her toes to keep the blood-flowing. She was curled into a ball to shield herself from the world, from him. Short blonde hair and brown eyes used to brave the walls of sanity but now her bangs were hanging and her vision was cloudy with desolate and non-existent hope. There was none left.

He smiled.

There were several long strides back into the other rooms of the cabin. It was humid and compact. It enraged him but he kept that secret to himself. Besides, how could he trust the Hawk's Eye anyways?

He carefully untucked his hand and cradled a mug in his palm. He smiled in his deliverance of the luke-warm coffee to the bedside, his heart beating quicker at the sound of the porcelain hitting the floorboards. She didn't even blink at the sound. He narrowed his eyes with immediate suspicion as he leaned in close, the clouds of her tiredness encasing his blade-like alertness. He pressed his thin lips to her forehead, below her hairline, and let her warmth fade into his frozen state. There was a raw emotion like affection coming from him when he pulled away, but it is unlike anything humans have encountered before. He was not Greed with the hunger for possession. He was not Lust with passion for her. He was not Gluttony for the indulgence in his hunger, but something new and equally sinful. She was his key and with her he'd get exactly what he needed.

"Come to the study when you're ready to begin." he said, his voice piercing the solid air between them. Only then did she partake in human action. Her eyelids wavered in a gentle hesitation that pleased him each time he saw it. Her eyes avoided him as he strode out of the room, a thin shadow with his hands in his pockets. He left her silent like always, and as he sat in his study with his notebook in hand, he could hear the mug being lifted from the ground and the liquid spilling cross her lips as if to reply, "As long as you keep your promise Solf," and in his head he silently whispered a "yes".

* * *

There was a time several years earlier when that same smirk was across his lips. Cold as the northern fort and deeper than the ridges in Riza's skin. It's still dark in the past, but a war has just ended. He was a hero. He wiped the enemies away. She did the same.

It was a common factor in their uncivilized and soldier-like way of living.

His hands were still tattooed with circles and grams he'd learned so long ago. They laid in his pockets as he stepped forward, time stopping as he reached his target spot with a comfortable ease that one shouldn't have had in the presence of a tied-up woman. Her hands and legs were bound with ropes, and a dirtied cloth cut into the sides of her mouth. Her military uniform was dirty with blood and saliva and it pleased him to see her this way. To see such a powerful bird of prey broken like this.

He didn't speak but there was a chuff of amusement as the sickness in his eyes yielded to even deeper evils of a demon's heart. He squats, his knees bent and muscles tight from constant standing. He tilts his head slowly, only now allowing himself the pleasure of looking into her eyes. There was terror in them. But there was courage. With time it would be gone.

He kissed her under her jaw and she whipped her head back with a cry from the back of her throat. It was broken and angry. There was a flame lit in her eyes now. He narrowed his own at her sudden rebirth into bravery.

"Were you on your way to see Mustang when I caught you, Riza?" he let her name rest on his tongue for a long time, drawing out every letter and syllable. He watched her squirm. In a flick of the wrist the cloth was gone from her mouth and her jaw was limp and her tongue dry. Somehow she summoned the content to spit in his eyes with a failing curse word on her lips. He smirked the evil smirk and didn't bother to wipe his face before tying the band around her head again. She howled in anger but there wasn't a coherent word.

He let his hand dive towards her and yank the fabric of her upper uniform part upwards to expose her fleshy side. There was panic in her eyes as his cold hand laid across her hip and he felt the warmth of her blood. He wanted to hear the destruction. He yearned for the explosion. His eyes closed as his palm tingled. Transmutation.

There was a scream. He was satisfied with his work.

* * *

She'd been moved to the cabin but the fight had not left her yet. Some people were born for battle and she was one of them. Her wrists had just begun to bear the marks that would stay with her for the rest of her life. She was laid across a wooden table, her back bear and her dirty uniform from weeks before still clinging to her body, sealed with the sweat of anger and anxiety. Kimblee stands beside her, arms crossed against his arrogant chest. The smirk is gone. Thoughts take it's place. She's trembling and he can see it. He can see it in the goosebumps on her back. He can see it in the way her arms were tensing, and he could see it by the way her shins shook in pain. She'd been lying like this for hours.

He overlooked the large patch of infected-pink skin on her side. It was the place that he started on his path to destroying her essence. He wanted the old Riza Hawkeye gone from this body. But the array on her back was what he wanted the most. If only he could have what Mustang had. Kimblee sought the flames. He sought the sounds that came with it. He sought the power it brought him.

He wants to burn the world into submission. He wants her to be submissive. She fights with all her strength though. His eye catches and there is a spark of intelligence in his mind. He flees to the nearest open space and bites into his flesh, drawing blood and refusing the temptation to lap it up with his own tongue. He touches his finger to it and draws a circle and several shapes to mirror the array. He leans over to tear a piece of cloth from his shirt and tosses it in the middle. He places his fingers to the sides of the circle. He closes his eyes.

He feels heat and he hears a crackle.

There are eyes on him.

There are tears flowing from them.

* * *

Only a week after he knows how to break her. He knows a name that will eradicate the hope for good. He's in the doorway with a frown. He asks her if she ever wants to leave. She scoffs. He realizes that he's never seen her sleep. For a moment he almost pities her.

"Roy Mustang is dead."

Her eyes grow wide but they remain at their steady location at the window. Her legs raise and her arms encircle them. Before long there is a shuffle and her face is buried in her knees and he can hear her sniffling.

Submission.

The smirk returns.

"I will only allow myself to live without escape attempts or trouble as long as you promise to kill me once you're research is complete." she says, slowly raising her chin. He feels intimidated. He's never felt this before with her. Riza Hawkeye is still alive, but she didn't know it.

"I promise."

There is a pause and the room grows dark as the sun falls. He turns and leaves her in the darkness.

* * *

On the day of the snow all those years later Kimblee still had not made a breakthrough. No matter how hard he tried, there was no out for him. Each word inscribed to Riza's body was a puzzle, and he cursed the Flame Alchemist daily as he searched for a way to decode the array. He took a moment of rest to stare down at her once again. Her eyes were closed and her cheek was pressed up against the table. She had become thin and square, a doppelganger to her past self. The patch from the first day is still there. It still gives him pleasure. There are most scars, more dents and breaks in her skin and body. He feels pride for them. He feels joy.

He looks from her ankles to her neck, letting his victories sink in.

He returns to looking at her tattoo. He will crack this code.

The smirk is now a smile.

* * *

Kimblee was regularly out of the cabin. He locked the doors from the outside and he had no fear that as long as he kept telling her that he'd keep her promise that she'd stay.

It was cold in the Eastern city. There was a dark-haired military officer standing with a cigarette. Kimblee moves beside him with a smug look. Mustang doesn't even look his way.

Kimblee asks if the Flame has a plan for the country.

Roy bluntly remarks that, "No one man can change this hell-hole. It's too late for me to begin to try." They stand and Kimblee allows himself to feel excitement. He asks about the blonde sniper and he senses Roy grow tense. The smoking officer tosses the cigarette into the street and turns away. Kimblee stands to watch the smoking paper smother itself into ash.

"What a shame she thinks you're dead." he chuckles to himself. He turns the opposite way into the wind.


	2. Part Two: Reprise

_A/N: There is slight Royai references but not much. Enjoy, and please review!_

* * *

Reprise

A repeated passage in music

* * *

There's a moment of silence. It is drawn out throughout the days with a sickening rhythm that slowed in the daylight and quickened in the dark. She noticed the breaths of her body draw quick as he strode through the home at dusk. The rhythm was stuck in her mind, her heartbeat catching up to it with each passing day.

She didn't dare to turn her head. She'd given her body to him but her attention belonged to dreams. It belonged to the outside. He couldn't take her mind just yet. He rushed with the smell of alcohol, a hurricane through the house, and with a clatter he was out of the house. There was deafening silence. Her eyes flicked to her own door and with a quickness she'd forgotten about she rushed to see where the source of his anger was from. She stood in the doorway with a loose tank top and a lack of any other major articles of clothing. Her thighs would have touched if not for the starvation she'd encountered. Long gone was the warmth she used to feel between her legs and in her core. Her arms barely brushed her ribs, the same boney weakness her legs carried. She let her eyes adjust to the light. She found an empty hallway and a cold draft. Her chest rose and fell as the chilly air gutted her and carried her away.

The door to the outside was left slightly ajar.

She blinked. Had she fallen ill? Asleep in the tireless days of pain and anger? She closed her eyes and let the chill rest on her skin. This was very much real.

In his drunken rage he'd forgotten to lock the door. She opened her eyes. He'd realize his mistake in a matter of moments. If she didn't act now...

She swallowed. It wasn't like him to be so careless. Something was wrong. She stepped towards the door and the eager pain of guilt thrust itself into her stomach. She felt the courage from so long ago return and fill her up. She blinked again and she was reborn.

Gliding from her spot she stole into her room and slipped on a pair of thick denim pants and a thin overcoat that would have to suit her on her trip. Riza began to think, her mind now overflowing with thoughts she'd left untouched in the years prior. She dashed from the room and to the door, leaving no time for hesitation or gentleness. She threw open the door, her eyes sharp for her tall and dark captor. She swung her body back and forth to look for a mode of escape, and like a miracle she'd asked for in her times of struggle she saw it. A car covered in snow just under five-hundred feet, or so she assumed. She ran to it, her peripherals scanning the soft white layers around her, and she swept off the snow on the front door, ignoring the bite of the snow. It was nothing to what she'd felt previously. She yanked open the door, struggling with the latch for a precious minute, but succeeded and entered the car. She slammed the door behind her, careless now. She just wanted out. The fire had started to burn inside her and she'd give it the embers to stay alive.

She leaned down and yanked at the chords below the dash. She blinked twice before she remembered the trick her old friend had taught her. She smiled at the memory of her teenage days. She hadn't had one in a while. A memory.

She broke the film with her teeth and touched the wires together, setting the car into a roar. She didn't take time to get excited and she immediately jerked the wheel, throwing all of her strength into the throttle and drove off, her head whirring with the feeling of faint.

* * *

She stopsped the car with a sudden jerk that throws her stomach forward and into her chest. She reaches down again and tugs the wires from their places, permanently parking the vehicle.

She jumped from the seat and jogged towards the nearest path. It hadn't even taken an hour to get to this point, and her disappointment in herself was growing at every passing second. She could have escaped. She could have left. If only she'd... If only...

Riza swept her anger away and replaced it with the hope she'd lost. There was something she had to do. She narrowed her eyes and went faster. Her legs ached and her stomach writhed inside her. She'd learned long ago to never trust Kimblee. She had faith in his dishonesty now.

She could tell that the town before her was in the East. The spread of houses and the rugged center told her she'd come to the right place.

She strode through the pain in her unused body, and ran right into the middle of the town, her eyes working hard to stay open and looking. She couldn't see as far as she used to. Lack of practice.

She found a light and rushed towards it, finding a beaten down bar without a name. She pushed her way inside and nervously looked around. There were men inside and the place was clouded with smoke. She coughed loudly, her lungs heaving out the air fast and quick, and all eyes were soon on her. She turned to the bartender who seemed to be the most interested in her appearance.

She has no words to say. She hasn't spoken to another person in so long.

"S-sir," she addresses him, her fists curled and her breath returning, "I n-need to use a phone." she says with a helpless whimper in her mouth. He gives her a look of pity and nods to his right. She turns quickly to see a telephone box, and her knees almost collapse when a thick book sits next to it. She begins to shake as she rushes to it and steps inside. The closeness of the glass to her skin sends a shiver up her back, but she ignores it and flips open the book, turning to the section for the 'M' names. The letters are engraved in her mind. She finds his name quickly. His address is written as well. There is something inside her that explodes. There is something inside her that rivets up her spine and into her neck. She picks up the phone and dials one number after the other, thinking for a long time about which number is which. Math had been dulled in her mind. Almost everything had.

She flinches when she hears the ringing sound. It drills into her head. The noise is ear shattering. And then it stops.

"Hello?" It's a deep and groggy word. She knows that voice. Her throat closes up. Her eyes widen. There is a blossoming flower in her chest. "Hello? Anybody the-" the phone is places delicately on the hook. She glances out of the box to see that the bartender is no longer interested in her. She tears the address from the book and closes it, slipping from the box and through the bar. She forgets to thank the man, and only thinks of it after she's outside the door and back into the cold, her eyes reading the numbers on the buildings until she finds the one she wants.

* * *

Her knuckles hurt when she knocks on the door. She steps backwards. Was this really happening?

She thinks about knocking again but her eyes notice a shift in the doorframe. Someone is unlocking the door. She swallows, the saliva rolling down her throat like ice. It hits her chest as the door opens. She inhales.

She sees his face. He sees hers. They melt like the snow.

* * *

Her throat is burning when her consciousness returns. She pushes up with her elbows and blinks open her eyes. She's alone in the bedroom. She's barren of clothing besides a chest wrap and underwear. She tastes decay. She's been sleeping.

She hugs herself to feel the warmth of a night after dreaming. She touches her hair and her face to make sure she's all there. She avoids the gashes in her body and before long her hands are back on the bed, feeling the dent in the mattress where another body should be.

She looks up with a gasp and he's standing in the door.

"You were out for four days." there is a cigarette between his teeth and a cup of something sweet-smelling in his hands. "You take milk and one sugar, right?" he asks, moving with ease to sit on the bed beside her. He places the cup on the table beside her and she freezes at the sound. Familiar.

She then remembers the night she arrived. She remembers whispering and crying. She remembers being tucked into the bed, and gentle and dark eyes watching her from across the room. Roy Mustang had been watching her.

"You're alive." she whispered in awe. Kimblee had lied. He always did.

Roy let out a laugh and nodded. "Yes I am..." his smile disappeared as his eyes roamed her body. The scars have finally caught his attention. "You don't have to tell me where you've been until you're ready." he said quietly, leaning closer to her to study her. She feels her heart quicken. She didn't mind her near-nakedness, or her physical shape, but what she feared was the spoken word. She had to speak.

She took her attention to the window and saw it was nearing night time again. She blinked slowly and turned back to him with a fearful nod. He smiled weakly, taking the cigarette from his lips and placing it on the table.

"You never smoked before." she commented in a hushed tone. He laughed. She felt weak from it.

"My friend Havoc got me into it. He didn't want to but I made him give me a pack. I needed some way to de-stress." he said, then growing bold in his temper and words, "I've been looking for you for so long, Riza." he said, furrowed brows and a frown marking his face. She nodded. Her heart dropped and her mind raced backwards to the day she was taken. She was going to see him. She was going to commit herself to him. Had he been looking since then?

"You just vanished without a trace... no records... I didn't think you were even real for a while." he remarked. She cringed. Her body in pain from his words.

She opened her mouth but nothing came out. There was a hand on her neck, running over the ridges.

"Tell me about them." he said. Her body. Her marks.

She let her eyes half-close, reaching up to touch her hand to his.

"The circles on my wrists and ankles are from rope burns. The ones on my neck are from knives and fingernails. The ones on my back are from anger. My legs for when I tried to escape. My side," she said, her hand now on the blotchy place, "my-my- side.." tears welled in her eyes. He leaned forward. He held her. She wept into his shoulder. She really had become weak.

"Do you remember your promise?" she asked as he touched his fingers to her hair. "The one about my back... my tattoo..." she said, muffled by fabrics that smelled like him. Warmth. It smelled like fire.

He nodded against her. He was weary.

"I need you to do it... tonight." He nods again. And she falls back into the darkness.

* * *

She sat on her knees. She wanted to be destroyed in the apartment. She silently willed him to kill her. But she wanted to stay alive.

He could hold her now. He could be with her. He could save her.

There is a snap and a flicker.

She screams with a vigor to suffice for the years of silent agony.

There's cold water on her heated back and she feels his hands sliding gauze over her wounds. She tries to thank him but she can't move nor speak. She's entranced with her inner warfare. She's broken herself and given in to the enemy. But she fights on inside. Her body crumbles in the sheets. He holds her pieces together but they both know it isn't enough.

The next time her eyes open is later into the night. His arms are around her and she can see the dried tears on his face. She wipes her own and looks up to the door. She isn't surprised. She was prepared for this.

A white-suited man stands and watches her. She is a child again. She is afraid.

"Hello." she whispered. There is no smirk to applaud her valiant effort in speech. She is taken again that night.


	3. Part Three: Resolve

_A/N: Welp, this is the end. It's really quick and simple. There will be questions you may have about specific happenings during the story and I'll be happy to answer them. This was meant to be an overall short and simple story, so that's how I wrote it. I'm sorry about the lack of quality in the last two chapters. _  
_Thank you to DGtnsl, Renoku, and BellaRichart for reviewing. _

* * *

Resolve

Settle or find a solution

* * *

It's cold under the sheets. His eyes opeened carefully and his arms stretch forward into the space. She's gone.

He sat up with a sudden guilt in his chest. There's blood on the sheets. He did it to her. His hands cover his eyes.

It seems that their love was one-sided. Unrequited. He breaks.

Two weeks of regretting his actions ended with three empty packs of cigarettes and a long and tiring sigh.

Mustang laid on his stomach, staring at his headboard, tracing his fingers across the grain. He yearns for her. She was so real and he wanted her. He wants her. His eyes ran lazily across the length of the board until they caught on a rough patch he'd never noticed before. He shifted and drew back the sheets to reveal letters carved into the wood. His heart began to beat faster. He jumped from the bed and rushed out the door. On his bed there was a message.

"Kimblee killed me."

* * *

There is a cabin to the north and he's found it. His shoe hit the door and the wood clattered against the floor. He peered inside. It was dark and hazy. But his eyes found the only thing he feared.

There was a body strewn across the floor. He rushes to her with blind screams of anger. He cradles her in his arms and he runs his fingers through her hair to wake her. Her lips are caked with blood. Her arms and legs are limp and she's cold. She'd freezing cold.

Her bruises will never heal. But her demons died along with her.

His hands grasped her tightly, pulling her to his chest and he screamed. He bit into her clothes for comfort and he screamed. He told her how sorry he is. He told her how beautiful she was. He told her he never should have used the alchemy. He blames himself. He stared at her eyes. There were peaceful. They were different than before.

He cries out as tears stream down his face. He thought to himself that if he'd just stayed awake she'd be okay. He had a bloodthirsty rage developing inside him. She laid in his arms for hours as he tried to call her back, but he couldn't. She'd been victorious in her fight but he'd lost his. He'd lost her.

* * *

There were years between that time and the time when he realized that, realized that she'd won.

Kimblee had assassinated four Generals before he was executed. By then the smirk had long gone, as well as his own hope.

Roy is a Major General when he next visits her grave. It's small and modest. It fit her. By the tenth year of her passing he realized Kimblee's plan.

Take the most powerful alchemy and use it to conquer. It enraged Roy each time he thought of it.

He thought of her gentle face as he lay flowers on her grave. He kissed his hand and placed it to the stone. He smiled.

He'd learned to never give up hope. She knew what she was doing the entire time. She knew. Maybe it would guide him on his path to victory. To achieving the position of Fuhrer.

"You won." he whispered as he turned to leave, letting the tears sting his cheeks. The battle for sanity and courage had been won. In death she had conquered great evil. Kimblee's destiny had been changed. Everyones' had.

She'd changed it.

She was brave.

In the end that was all she was. And in her dying moments, she was the one wearing the smile.

* * *

_A/N 2: Well that was sad wasn't it? Yeah, sorry guys. Heh heh. (not really?) _

_You may have questions about this so please don't be afraid to ask. _

_I will tell you this, though, Kimblee left carelessly assuming she'd stay. But he was obviously wrong. And he often stayed in the city for a few days, so when he returned he found the house absent and panicked. It took a while for him to find her but yes he did break in and re-capture her. She still had courage to the very end. He killed her after he saw that her back was defaced, and ran to get power in another way. _

_Thanks for reading! I'll be posting again soon. :) _


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